Photo: http://kusabana.fc2web.com/index1.html — CC BY-SA 3.0 · source
Survives zone 5 through 9
Harvest calendar
Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.
⚠ Fresh fruit is juicy and sweet-tart, with skin ranging from red to purple-black over amber-yellow flesh; eaten fresh, dried, or made into jams and Asian-style plum sauces — kernels inside the pit are cyanogenic and should not be eaten.
- Hardiness
- Zone 5–9
- Habit
- Tree
- Edible part
- Fruit
- Ripens
- Summer–autumn
- Mature size
- Tree 6–10 m
- Light
- Full sun
- Soil pH
- 6.0–7.0 (near-neutral)
- Environment
- Temperate
- Native range
- Native to China and long cultivated and further developed in Japan; introduced to the United States in the late 19th century, notably through Luther Burbank's breeding work.
- Status
- Cultivated
- Years to fruit
- 2–4 yrs
- Growth speed
- Medium — roughly 30–60 cm/year once established
- Spacing
- 500 cm (197 in) apart — about 25 m² (269 sq ft) per plant
- Leaf shape
- Simple, ovate to elliptic leaves 5–10 cm long with finely serrated margins and glossy green upper surfaces.
- Root system
- Worth knowing that in cultivation this is usually the rootstock's root system, not the species' — most Prunus are sold grafted, and vigour, suckering and soil tolerance follow the stock rather than the top. On its own roots the species is shallow-rooted, with the bulk in the top 40–60 cm spreading well beyond the canopy, so it dislikes cultivation underneath and competes badly with grass.
- Fruit description
- Rounded to oval drupe 4–7 cm across with smooth red-to-purple-black skin, often with a light waxy bloom, and juicy amber-yellow flesh around a flattened, clinging stone.
- Propagation
- Almost always propagated by budding or grafting selected cultivars onto plum or peach seedling rootstock; seedlings don't come true to type, so seed is used mainly for rootstock or breeding.
- Pollination
- Varies by species — see notes
The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.
Growing guide
Fertilizing. Responds best to a balanced, moderate feeding program (e.g. 10-10-10) rather than heavy nitrogen — high-nitrogen fertilization is linked to increased brown rot (Monilinia) in Japanese plum orchards.
Growing tips. Requires fewer chill hours than European plums (some cultivars need as little as 200–300 hours), which suits milder winters but also leaves early blossoms vulnerable to late-frost damage. Highly susceptible to black knot and brown rot; remove and destroy infected wood promptly.
Companion planting. Black knot fungus (Apiosporina morbosa) spreads readily between cultivated plums and nearby wild Prunus — remove neglected wild plum, chokecherry, or black cherry stands growing near an orchard.
Grow journal
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